156 Midland Village: Railway and Woodland. 



and sheltered by bramble-bushes ; it seems to 

 need something to climb up and down, and to 

 creep about in ; like the sedge-birds, it seldom 

 flies any distance, and one is tempted to fancy 

 that all these species would gradually lose the 

 use of their wings as genuine organs of flight, 

 if it were not for the yearly necessities of 

 migration. 



I once had a remarkable opportunity of watch- 

 ing this very curious bird. It was about the 

 beginning of May, before the leaves had fully 

 come out ; a time which is very far the best 

 in the year for observing the smaller and 

 shyer birds. Intent on pairing or nest-build- 

 ing, they have little fear, if you keep quite 

 quiet, and you can follow their movements with 

 a glass without danger of losing sight of them 

 in the foliage. I was returning from a delicious 

 morning ramble through Bruerne wood, and 

 was just rounding the last corner of it, where 

 a small plantation of baby saplings was just be- 

 ginning to put on leaf, when my ear caught the 

 unmistakable ' reel ' of this bird. Some other 

 birds of the warbler kind, Wren, Robin, Sedge- 



